Those Three Little Words
by Ragingstillness
Summary: Zades Soulmate Modern AU. This is based off of an amazing entry on a list of otp prompts I found. They are so cute in this fic it's killing even me.
1. Chapter 1

Hades hoped he'd find his soulmate one day despite it all. It all being all the terrible examples of soulmate matchups he regrettably been exposed to over time. The most obvious being his brother and his soulmate.

Zeus had become aware of his soulmate quite early, at about nineteen, one of his worse ages. The other factor that really made the situation so irreparable was that he actually knew his soulmate. It was rare but it happened and no one had been more surprised than he to learn he was destined to be with his next door neighbor, a girl named Hera.

They could not have been more different in lifestyle. She tended towards monogamous relationships while he flirted with anything that moved, she drank buckets of tea, he drank buckets of beer. Sadly, they had been destined for each other and there was little they could do about it. However, a soulmate promised only a happy end, not necessarily a happy middle, or even beginning in Zeus' case.

The connection became clear to the two of them the same way it did for everyone else. One of them drew a specific symbol on themselves and then barely minutes later the design appeared on the other person's skin, in the same spot.

Zeus' had been a rose that Hera drew on the knuckle of her thumb. Unfortunately, he messed it up, as he did most things, by being himself. Nineteen was the year he dated more girls than he ever had before, loving and leaving in equal measure. Hera was appropriately disgusted and ended up taking out her rage on his girlfriends often, rather than him.

Hades had suggested she redirect her anger to where it belonged, one strange night when she had come raging to him instead. She hadn't taken it well and Zeus nearly beat him for it.

He hadn't interfered in their fights for the next four years, just keeping his head down through their on and off dating, flings, and break ups. So, in conclusion, he hadn't seen the best out of the soulmate idea. However, he was an incurably hopeless romantic, and when he went off to college and saw a few better examples, he became ever more excited to finally get one himself.

He graduated in four years with a bachelor's in business and geology each. He got a relatively cushy job right out of college due to his good grades and resume, working for a gem mining business. It was really his dream job, a perfect mix of his two interests.

Yet no matter how comfortable his life became, he was really becoming quite unhappy with the lack of any sort of design appearing on his skin. He drew several on himself on occasion, hoping he'd picked the right one, but the soulmate symbol could be literally anything and it wasn't likely.

Then one day, when he was walking home from work late at night, a sensation struck him. It began as a gentle pressure on his chest, a single point moving back and forth, tracing some sort of image over the left side of his body. He quickly pulled back his shirt to see what it was but the street was too dark and he couldn't make it out.

Hades rushed home, throwing his coat and bag on the couch before rushing into the bathroom. He pulled his white button-down over his head and stared into the mirror. His breath caught in his throat.

Drawn in looping pen strokes over his heart was, well, a heart. An anatomically correct heart, with all the ventricles and tubes drawn in painstaking detail. The most special part of it all was how, in the very middle of the design, his soulmate had drawn a tiny heart, the kind generally seen on Valentine's cards rather than in medical textbooks. The rest of the design was beautiful but he could tell that the tiny loops, meeting at a point then curving out to meet each other again, was the symbol he had been waiting for.

Hades traced the symbol with his finger, smiling into the mirror. After years of waiting and enduring the teasing of others, he finally had found them, the person he was destined to spend his life with.

The image in front of his eyes blurred, and he realized he was crying, laughing and smiling but crying none the less. He let the tears fall freely, their wet warmth the most welcome sensation he had ever felt. His hands came down to brace against the counter and he cried until no more tears came out and his shoulders shook with laughter.

In a suddenly child-like mood, he pulled his cellphone out of his pocket and typed in his home number. The line rang for a couple moments then a voice picked up on the other end, his mother's questioning tone ringing clear and true to his ears.

"Hello, Hades? What's going on, you generally don't call and never this late?"

He caught his breath then it all spilled out in a rush.

"Hi Mom. I was just calling because…well…I got my soulmate."

His mother gasped.

"You did! I'm so happy for you! What was the symbol?"

"A heart."

He heard his mother sigh happily.

"That's adorable. Where did you find it?"

He laughed into the phone.

"That's the funny part, whoever my soulmate is, they drew it actually on my heart."

His mother laughed too.

"That's even cuter."

There was a comfortable silence.

"I'm so happy for you, son. I know how much you've wanted this. What are you going to do next?"

Hades stumbled a little on this question. He hadn't really given it much thought.

"I don't really know."

"You don't know? Come on, you have to contact them. They won't know it worked until you do."

"But what do I draw? What if they don't like it? I-I don't really know what I'm doing."

His voice got a bit higher in pitch as he panicked. His mother's laughter echoed down the line.

"Calm down honey, everything's going to be fine. I would recommend just drawing what they did, but in a different spot."

"That's going to be kind of difficult."

"Why? It's just a heart."

"Yes, but there's a bit more."

He could almost hear his mother's confusion.

"They did draw a heart, but that was just at the center of a much more complicated design that I don't think I'll be able to replicate. Because, you see, the rest of the design was also a heart, but an anatomical one, with all the tubes and everything."

"Wow, your soulmate is quite the artist. Then you don't have to replicate that, just draw something else and include the little heart in it."

"Ok…Thanks Mom."

"Anytime honey, I wish you the best of luck."

He nodded although she couldn't see and hung up. He was alone in the house so he spun around in a little twirl, just reveling in happiness. He considered calling his brother and boasting, but at this time of night his brother would probably be busy with other things. Things he didn't really feel like interrupting.

Hades walked back to the couch and pulled a fountain pen out of his bag. Then he carried a stool back to the bathroom and sat down. He took a quick photo of his soulmate's design with his phone then set it aside, lifting the pen.

For a moment he agonized about where to put the design on his body, wanting his soulmate to find it but not wanting them to have to cover it in front of others. Finally he decided on his upper left arm.

Then came actually deciding on the design. It had to be beautiful, something to show his devotion to his soulmate but not too large. He thought about the beautiful things in his life, and his job immediately came to mind, the shimmering images of cut gems and strains of diamond in rock coming to mind. It came to him immediately.

He set the pen to his skin and got to work. It was an hour later when he finished and as he looked down, he was quite satisfied.

He had drawn an intricate geode, cracked open so the shimmering bullion inside was clearly visible. The center was the only area left free and with a deep breath he reached down and drew a heart in that spot, completing the connection.

As his pen traced the last connecting line, he felt a shimmer of heat flutter through his body, connecting him to his soulmate.

Hades glanced at the clock, it was almost midnight. He didn't expect a response, when his soulmate may or may not be already asleep so there was only damage he could do to his health by staying up.

He got ready for bed leisurely, slipping into an old white T-shirt and black shorts before slipping in between the sheets. The minute his head hit the pillow he was asleep, a smile still stretching his face.

Zelena sat back in her chair and stretched as the last patient of the day left the room. The little boy had been running a fever of 100 degrees Fahrenheit and he was only five so his mother had come in with a bit of panic flashing over her face. Zelena had quickly calmed the woman down, diagnosing the boy with the seasonal flu and prescribing the proper antibiotics.

He had been miserable so she made sure to give him a sticker before he left and a short hair ruffle, promising him he would get better. Thankfully his face had brightened at that and he left the room a little less unhappy than when he had come in. Zelena considered that a job well done.

One of her fellow pediatricians came into the room.

"Good job today Dr. Mills. It's the height of flu season so we all generally get a little overworked but you haven't complained once."

Zelena smiled at the older woman.

"No problem. This is what I love to do, there's no reason for me to complain."

The woman smiled and waved as she left. Zelena sighed and stood, putting her tools away, washing her hands one last time, then picking up her purse. She almost forgot to shed her coat but at the last moment she remembered to hang it up on the hooks.

She pushed out of the center's doors, and made her way slowly to her car. Her way home was quiet except for the music coming softly out of the radio. She pulled up into the driveway then got her keys out, regretting slightly her decision to work so late, as her favorite television program was probably already over, but as she said, this was her dream.

She had loved kids ever since her teenage years, when her sister had invited her to take a couple education classes. Both of them had retained that love of children, her sister becoming a teacher as well as adopting a little boy named Henry. Zelena had gone over into children's health, suffering happily the pressure of medical school in order to become the pediatrician she was that day.

Her sister had found her soulmate about two years ago. The man, named Robin, had drawn an arrow onto his arm, in preparation to get it as a tattoo, and the image had appeared on her sister's arm.

Regina had squealed at the time and rushed across the entire college campus to burst into her sister's dorm room and show her. Her roommates had initially been a little pissed to wake up in the middle of the night but they loved Regina as much as Zelena did and quickly the room was filled with quiet shrieks of happiness.

Through a series of messages Regina wrote back and forth with her soulmate, using her skin as a medium, she did eventually meet him, and the two of them had been happily dating for the past years.

Zelena was quite happy for them but she did think Robin should have proposed by now. Maybe she was just trying to live vicariously through her sister, as her soulmate still hadn't shown up. She had tried drawing some shapes on herself, but got no reply and no feeling of contentment that everyone said came with getting the symbol right.

Stumbling into her living room, she set her bag down on the end table then flopped down onto the couch, picking up the anatomy textbook she had been reviewing the night before. She was always trying to refresh her skills so she could help her patients better. They were the future of the human face. And quite cute.

She flipped through a couple pages, absentmindedly wondering what to have for dinner. The page she eventually landed on was in the cardiology section, with a large heart drawn up in detail on the page.

She set the book down and made dinner. After watching TV reruns as she ate, she picked up the book again, twirling a pen in her fingers and trying to concentrate on the model.

It was no use, she wasn't able to focus. She lazily began to twist the pen in her hair then a thought struck her.

She sat up and pulled her tank top over her head. Setting the book on her lap so she could see the model, she carefully set the pen to her skin, etching the heart model over the skin that covered her own heart.

She stopped with nothing but the center of the heart left to do. That part of the image was covered up with a blurb, giving some information about the model. She frowned. How was she supposed to complete the drawing when the textbook covered it up?

Resigning herself to the impossibility of guessing what the covered section looked like, she contented with drawing a small heart shape in the blank space. Her pen connected the final line. She was already resting under a blanket so she missed the fluttery warmth that came with the movement.

Zelena sighed and snuggled more under the blanket. Her bed would definitely be the better option for sleeping and she hadn't showered but the next day was Saturday and she didn't have to work. And the couch really was quite soft. The book dropped to the floor and her hands folded softly over her own stomach, before her eyes closed.

The clock in the corner of the TV showed three in the morning when she got her reply, the geode design appearing on her arm. Sadly, its owner was too deeply in sleep to feel it. Oh well, she'd notice in the morning.

That she did. Zelena woke with a large yawn and a crick in her neck from sleeping on the couch. She sat up, trying to stretch it out. The crick was not so easily gotten rid of and its pain told her so. She mentally sighed and got up to take a shower, hoping the sensation would go away.

She took the shower still half asleep, her eyes periodically blinking into oblivion as she tried to massage the aches away under the hot water. Zelena finished up and wrapped a towel around herself, moving to the mirror in order to comb her hair out. Tying the towel under her arms, she leaned forward and reached for the comb. Then she froze.

She swept her hand over the wet haze coating the reflective surface. As it finally cleared she gasped. There on her arm was an intricate picture, drawn in pen. The shower hadn't even smudged it and she definitely hadn't put it on herself, so she knew immediately what it meant.

Turning this way and that she ascertained slowly what it was. The outer edges seemed to be a rock of some kind, broken open to show the jagged edges of jewels, and in the very center, a simple heart.

She pulled back her towel to see if that heart she had drawn last night was still there and it wasn't. The image had vanished but she knew the heart was drawn exactly the same.

Her hands trembled as she rewrapped the towel, gazing at the design on her arm. It had obviously been drawn with care and intimate knowledge of what a geode looked like. She didn't really know what to do now, but her smiled just kept getting wider with every time her fingers traced the lines, so delicately drawn by her soulmate. Her soulmate, she had a soulmate! Maybe that was why the whole room suddenly felt wonderfully new.

Only now that she was happy did she realize how kind of tired she had been becoming with her old life. She had all this that she did but no one to share it with, now she might be able to. Even if she was helpless to know what happened next. Best to consult an expert.

Zelena rushed through her morning routine so she could pick up the phone and dial her sister's number. An answer came almost immediately but it was Robin's deep voice that actually came from the headset.

"Zelena?"

"Hello Robin, could you give the phone to my sister?"

"Sure, she's right here."

Zelena heard some dishes clinking and muffled conversation between two voices then her sister's voice came suddenly.

"Hi sis. How are you?"

"I'm great actually and I have news."

"Really, what?"

Zelena paused.

"I got my soulmate."

She heard Regina squeal through the phone.

"Really? Tell me all about it."

Robin's voice sounded in the background, asking what had happened and Regina turned away from the phone to tell him. He yelled out some sort of congratulations moments after. Regina came back on.

"So how did it happen sis?"

Zelena smiled at her sister's enthusiasm and leaned back against the counter.

"Well I drew first then they drew back some time while I was asleep."

"What did you draw?"

"I was reading this anatomy textbook and thought it would help me memorize a picture of the heart if I drew it on my own heart. So I did but the center was covered up by some words. I just drew a little heart shape in the empty space and I think that was it."

"Your soulmate symbol is a heart? That's so adorable."

"Yeah."

"What did they draw back?"

"A geode, cracked open, with the same heart shape in the very center."

Regina awwwed.

"Wow, your soulmate is really romantic."

Zelena laughed.

"I can hope so."

"So what will you do now? You could write them, the way Robin and I did."

"I could but I don't think I will. I kind of want to do it the old fashioned way, and just draw little things back and forth. Writing them just seems too direct, I want to give them time to get to know me. No offense."

"None taken, everyone has their way. Good luck sis."

"Thanks Regina."

Zelena hung up the phone. She opened the fridge and found she had just enough milk for the day but not much for later. She automatically went to write the reminder on her arm then remembered. Her soulmate would see it. At the thought, a strange thrill went through her. It was wonderful to think that someone else would be able to share in the goings on of her life.

Still smiling, she put pen to her arm and wrote, "buy milk." She capped the utensil and set it in her pocket, making sure she'd have it on hand for later.

She had not made many plans that day but in her new mood, seeing that movie she'd been wondering about sounded perfect. Zelena quickly ordered a ticket online at her local theater then picked up her coat and swept outside.

Coincidentally she ran into a few friends at the theater. The group was composed of three women, one called Nicene who Zelena had been friends with since college, one named Glinda that she only recently had been able to get alone with, and another named Emma who was a mutual friend with Regina. The four women gushed over each other, chatting about their lives as they ordered popcorn.

Oddly enough, it was Glinda who noticed first a change in Zelena. She commented on it as they grabbed the greasy bags from the seller.

"You seem really happy, did something happen?"

Zelena smiled back at her.

"Actually yes."

Nicene raised an eyebrow. "Well, are you going to tell us or just hold it over our heads?"

Zelena clasped her hands together.

"I got my soulmate."

The three woman immediately erupted in cheers and several people around them looked around for the source of the commotion. Nicene grabbed Zelena's hands and swung her around in a circle.

"I'm so happy for you! This is awesome!"

Emma was equally happy and gave Zelena a hug after Nicene had calmed down. Although they didn't know each other very well, Glinda gave Zelena an encouraging smile and a congratulations.

Her smile only seemed to grow with the approval of her friends. They immediately demanded the details as they sat through the previews. She told them about the symbol and what her soulmate had drawn, prompting more muffled screaming.

Nicene tugged on her arm.

"You have to show us before it goes away."

Zelena obliged them, pulling her coat off and allowing Nicene to hold up her phone's flashlight app so they could all see. The women oohed and ahhed over the design, especially impressed with the attention to detail.

Zelena just couldn't stop smiling. It was as though she had the person right next to her, showing them off to her friends. She was even able to feel a touch of pride when the girls complimented how much work was put into the image.

The movie began and she pulled her coat back on, the woman all turning their cellphones off. The flick was an adorable animated one, made for children, that left them all with a sense of juvenile fulfillment which buoyed Zelena all the way back home.

She made herself some lunch and while she was eating suddenly felt a light pressing sensation on her right arm. She pulled back her sleeve and saw the words appear. "Meeting today at five." It was just a simple phrase, not really even meant for anyone, but it was so heartening to see, just the knowledge that her soulmate was willing to share their life with her.

There was a pause and she was about to turn back to her meal when the pressure began again and she watched as the shape of a miniature lily came into being on her wrist, right after the words.

She pulled her pen out of her pocket and quickly scrawled a bicycle next to what she had written earlier, making that her signature.

It took only a few moments before on the back of her hand appeared a little smiley face.

It was so impossibly adorable that she had to laugh, ignoring how strange it seemed to be laughing alone in her house.

She picked up her pen and gave the smiley face a pair of cat ears and a tongue. As her pen brushed over the lines her soulmate had written, that same warmth of the first design she got came over her.

There wasn't any reply for a bit and she finished her meal, settling down on the couch to read a romance novel she had been wanting to read but hadn't the energy to pick up for several days.

A few pages in she felt something on her chest, the same spot where she had drawn the heart earlier. She pulled her shirt to the side a little and saw her soulmate had drawn their heart symbol there.

The pressure didn't go away but the design remained the same. She frowned for a moment then realized what was happening and flushed a little. Her soulmate was tracing the design with a pen, over and over again.

Her heart sped up at how open they were with their love, even though the two of them hadn't met. She had to respond somehow to that much emotion, so she pulled her pen and drew an arrow through the heart.

It was so amazing to feel the little touches of warmth as they both drew on the same spot at the same time. It was almost as though she could feel their fingers, brushing hers.

They stopped tracing the heart shape so she continued, running her pen over the arrow multiple times.

After a short while she set it aside and snuggled into the couch, feeling happier than she had in years.

She picked up the novel again and after a few minutes felt one little poke on the back of her hand. There was only a single pen dot there. She wondered what it was for then realized the drawing wasn't important, it had been the sensation. A little pressure on the back of her hand, almost like…a kiss. Her face turned bright red.

She could have responded but the "kiss" felt kind of like a farewell and she didn't want to bother her soulmate when they had somewhere to be.

Her mind wandered reluctantly off her mysterious and unbelievably romantic soulmate, and back to the romance novel. Normally she read them just for fluff but it all felt a bit too relevant and what she had always considered a pastime suddenly felt like a guilty pleasure. No matter, she enjoyed the happy ending and set the book aside in a very pleasant mood.

She had absolutely nothing to do that day, no obligations, and a soulmate. It had been a very satisfying past five hours. Zelena allowed her mind to wander off her worries, something she generally didn't do, and began to slowly file through her wishes, her brain childishly asking, "What should I do today?"

 **Author's note: I would love to claim this as my own idea but it is based off a list of otp prompts I found. For anyone who cares, Nicene is indeed my OC from my other Zelena-centric fic, Oz Meet World. I hope you find this as incredibly cute as I found it. I'm trying to hit all the Zades clichés I can. Please R &R. **


	2. Chapter 2

Despite her optimistically busy outlook on the rest of that day, Zelena ended up spending it indoors, catching up on shows she was trying to finish and eating celebration food.

It was almost eight at night and she was getting ready for bed when she felt a faint rubbing on her right arm. The sensation corresponded perfectly to where her soulmate had written their reminder.

She looked and saw the words slowly disappearing. It hadn't yet been the twelve hours that it took to for a soulmate design to disappear on its own so the natural conclusion was that they had decided to wash the words away.

Zelena pondered why for a moment, tucking her feet up onto her bed so they wouldn't get cold.

The words were written quite low on her arm, almost on her wrist really. If her soulmate had a meeting it would have made sense that they should probably erase the reminder because unless they were wearing sleeves that covered their hands, any motion would reveal the words.

While the world didn't put any shame on the soulmate design concept, it was expected that work still had a modicum of professionalism and a separation of public and private life. Therefore, it wasn't against any laws, but was frowned upon to have visible soulmate designs at work unless the two were about to be married. Then the little drawings were much more accepted as a celebration of a coming union.

The only issue with her situation was the timing. It was eight and the meeting had been at five. Had her soulmate just forgotten to erase it during the meeting and only just had the free time to? Although she knew practically nothing about this person, it didn't match up.

The answer struck her so hard and so obviously she fell back onto her bed, ashamed she hadn't thought of it already.

Time difference.

It was really quite rare that soulmates would live in the same area and not always in the same country even. If she did the math, she was three hours ahead of them.

Her feet suffered the cold tile floor to pad over to her computer and pull up a map of the United States and its time zones. She hovered a finger over the screen in New York, where she was, then moved three hours over. Her finger ended up stroking up and down the West Coast in the Pacific Time Zone. It was still a large area but at least she had narrowed down somewhat where they lived.

She wanted so badly to reveal this information to her soulmate, by drawing a map or something on herself, but then she remembered the meeting they needed to get to and restrained her excitement. It wouldn't be easy to go bed now, with the knowledge swirling around in her head, but she would have to try in order to sleep long enough that her soulmate would be up and ready to communicate the next day.

/

Hades pulled on the collar of his dress shirt one more time, wishing his boss wasn't quite so obsessed with all that new age "casual workplace" silliness. Whatever happened to dressing for success and taking the time to chose an outfit before leaving in the morning? So here he stood in the bathroom of his office building, grimacing at the plain white _unbuttoned_ shirt he was wearing, with no tie, no vest, and no suit jacket.

Strangely enough though, his boss was as equally strict about soulmate designs as he was lenient about business clothing. In yet more eccentricity his boss solved the dichotomy by claiming he wanted to be friends with his workers, but abhorring being nosy or over-informed about anyone's life. Therefore, he didn't want to know who had a soulmate and who didn't or how they communicated their love.

Thankfully the designs on Hades' chest were covered by the shirt and the ones on his hand as well as the daring little kiss he had put on his cheek were done with felt marker and just rubbed off during the day without him having to do anything about them. Except for one.

The actual writing of the meeting reminder had been initially done in ballpoint pen, before he realized how ill-advised this was and changed writing utensils.

So now he was faced with a dilemma. He didn't want to hurt his soulmate's feelings, but he really did need to wash the design off before the meeting where it would surely be visible whenever he made a gesture. His soulmate seemed to be an understanding person, but did he want to risk it?

Yes, he did. He had to trust his soulmate to understand why he had to get rid of the design. Every truly successful relationship he had been privy to had been built on trust.

With trembling hands he turned on the water and soaped up his right hand to wash off the writing. Seeing as no angry message came back within the minutes of his words being wiped away, Hades figured he was safe.

Frowning once more at his much too informal reflection, he moved out of the room and on to the conference. It was standard fare, a new vein had been struck of rubies and the company had secured the rights with masterful flair. The material was already coming in and being cut to make rings and bracelets.

A cheer went up around the table when Hades announced that he had secured the business of yet another major jewelry manufacturer. The rest of the meeting was pleasant, if uneventful, and they all got done in an hour.

Hades was just finishing shoving his papers into his briefcase, hoping against reason that his boss would someday ditch the idea of Saturday meetings, when one of his closer colleagues approached.

The man's name was Charon and he had been a great help to Hades over the years they had both worked at the company. Hades had always been somewhat higher ranked than Charon but their friendship continued, through all the ups and downs of work.

Charon clapped Hades on the shoulder and began a conversation they had been having for years.

"Hey man are you coming tomorrow? We're having a little party at my house, you know, just to celebrate another week done."

Charon had these parties every Sunday night, just to boost moral among the company. Hades had attended the first one, only to discover that every other man at the party either brought their soulmate with them or spent the entire party talking about them. He was a pretty smooth socializer, but even his skills hadn't prevented him from feeling a little left out. He hadn't come to any since, unwilling to face those circumstances for just a couple of glasses of wine and men who liked the casual business model more than his boss did.

However, the circumstances had changed.

Hades closed the clasp of the briefcase and hefted it over his shoulder. He smiled at Charon.

"I think I will come. What time?"

Charon's face lit up. There was only one reason Hades would finally have agreed and it made his heart glad to see his longest friend at the company finally within arms length of finding his perfect match.

"Seven at night, like usual," he added teasingly.

Hades took the miniature jab in stride, shaking hands with Charon and walking out the door. His own house was quiet and dark, but it seemed much less so with the knowledge that his soulmate existed.

He poured himself a cup of tea, then sat at the back bay window, staring out into his darkening back yard and wondering what kind of person his soulmate was. He knew almost nothing about them, not their name, their age, or even their gender.

No one really knew how long back the soulmate "magic" of sorts had existed, but for as long as Hades could remember, the whole concept of having a specifically gendered companion hadn't made much of an impact on anyone he'd met. There were definitely still preferences, but plenty of people he knew had ended up happy with a soulmate that hadn't matched their original guess of what that person would be like.

And it wasn't as if he really could guess yet from the material he had received from his soulmate. An anatomical heart, a bicycle, and a reminder to buy groceries were entirely gender-neutral. He had to consider all the possibilities.

However, most soulmates did match at least a couple of each other's preferences. Hades leaned back and took a sip of the tea. He'd start simple.

In general he had always preferred people with vibrant eye colors. This made little sense, considering that his entire family had shockingly bright eyes but he despised almost all of them. Yet, just the same, he had a history of instantly liking people with complex, deep eyes more.

So he closed his eyes and imagined the most vibrant eye color he could, coming up with a shining blue-green that pierced right to the soul. He held the image in his head, admiring his own imagination, when suddenly he felt a warmth in his chest, over the spot where the heart had first been drawn.

His eyes snapped open, but there was no design he could see. Yet there had been that rush of heat. He must have nailed it, perfectly guessing what his soulmate's eyes looked like. His lips curved upward of their own volition.

The tea grew cold in his hands as he pondered those gorgeous eyes. He was sure that when he met his soulmate that steely gaze would floor him. He'd be lucky to get a single word out. What a person his soulmate must be.

Hades' watch chirped to let him know it was almost ten at night and he needed to get to sleep. Pursing his lips at it, he gently slipped his legs off the window seat and onto the floor. He winced at how cold it felt, even through his black golden-toe business socks. The cold persisted until he had hopped, skipped, and tip toed over the tile floor of the connected kitchen like a child playing hopscotch.

His last step slipped a little and he had to grab the wall to keep from spinning in an entire circle and falling over. As it was, he ended up facing the window seat. That seat had always been too large for his liking, and when he had asked the builder, who knew full well the single man was going to live there, why the seat was so large, the man had looked at him in the pity of age and experience, saying "Son, that seat is for you and your soulmate. That's why it's so large."

Hades pictured himself, sitting with his feet tucked up, rather than stretched out as they had been, and a fuzzy outline of a body with those glorious eyes sitting across from him. He grinned, finally knowing what the builder had intended. The man was wiser than Hades had given him credit for. He fell into bed quickly afterward, dreaming of infinite depths of blue-green.

/

Sunday woke Zelena bright and early, shining itself all over her pillows and across her face, slanting through the window where she had forgotten to pull the curtain down the night before. She groaned and tried to bury her face in the pillow, but the light scorched the insides of her eyelids irrevocably orange.

She flailed one arm out from the warmth of her blanket burrito as though trying to ward the light off. But sadly the window was too far from the bed and the sun certainly wasn't going anywhere. She was going to have to get up. Of course this meant her day started with a scowl and freezing feet.

She checked herself after a shower that took much too long to get warm, and found no new drawings from her soulmate. It was six where she was, so it was inconceivable they would have written anything from five in the afternoon on a Saturday night to three in the morning on a Sunday, but the lack of contact was disappointing just the same.

She was just beginning to take in her coffee rush when the phone rang. It was one of her co-workers on the phone, saying they had a sudden rush of new patients and they needed her to come in. She sighed and accepted, groaning only once the receiver had fallen with a clank back into the cradle.

Sweeping her doctor's coat over her shoulders, Zelena quickly put her hair in a sensible ponytail and rushed to her car.

The minute she stepped into the office of pediatrics she knew it was going to be one of those days. The nurses were walking the halls frantically and she could practically hear the nervously reassuring voices of the receptionists from there.

A nurse rushed up to her and handed her a schedule of everyone she had to see. Her eyebrows went up and the nurse cowered, anticipating the reaction of one of their most loyal doctors to orders that would take up at least the entire day. Instead of throwing a fit, which she most certainly was on the inside, Zelena just sighed and walked off to her first appointment.

They were unpleasant to say the least. The first little girl was fine and quick to deal with, an easy diagnosis, if not for her mother. The woman had apparently taken some beginning community center classes on disease and took it upon herself to criticize Zelena's analysis, providing what she must have thought sounded like convincing arguments but weren't. And the poor girl was maybe six.

Zelena couldn't waste valuable time arguing with the crazy woman, but needed to make it clear so she wouldn't go buy antibiotics for a disease the little girl didn't have. She took care of the situation with as much delicacy as she could, along with thinly veiled irritation, but was still a couple minutes late for her next appointment.

This one was its own kind of demon. The parents were wonderful, friendly, and open to suggestions. The problem was the kid. He had an easy problem to fix and Zelena gave the instructions to the parents with ease. Or so that should have been how it went.

She gave the instructions all right, but with frequent pauses when she had to answer the little boy's insistent questions about being a doctor. The first seven were cute, the rest began to lean over into the territory of being unbelievably annoying.

Zelena managed to not be any more late to her next appointment, but was still late from the first one.

The day continued much in the same manner, kid after kid with varying problems and her duty to solve them. Several near the end were actually quite pleasant, and reminded her why she loved kids, but then she got to her last appointment of the day.

It was an older girl, nearing the age where she'd move to a doctor for adults. She was also someone Zelena had seen before, had watched grow up, a teen named Sophia. Sophia was just in for a routine check up, and all was going well, Sophia was in perfect health, until they got to the part where Sophia's mom left so doctor and patient could just talk.

Sophia sat on the examination bed, swinging her legs back and forth with the idleness of adolescence and Zelena slid onto the fake leather of her desk chair, smiling up at her. She asked the standard questions, "How is school going?" "Is your home life ok?" And then the one she always finished with, "Are you happy with your life?"

It was this one that stopped Sophia, the girl's knuckles tightening on the crinkly sanitary paper. Her head fell to her chest and when Zelena approached her Sophia looked up, tears streaming down her face.

Zelena immediately took hold of one of her hands, looking deep into Sophia's eyes.

"Honey what's wrong?"

Sophia sniffed. Zelena gave her hand a little squeeze.

Then Sophia sucked in a giant breath and it all came out in several wet sentences.

When Zelena had first met Sophia, the girl had been jumpy, almost impossible to control, the reason being the puppy her parents had just bought her before taking her to the doctor's office. Sophia's parents had ensured Zelena there was no correlation between the events, but they did so with sheepish smiles.

Every time Sophia came in after that she had a new story to tell about the dog, who she named Liam, after her favorite book character. Sophia and Liam did everything together and had for the last few years. Zelena had even met Liam once, when she happened to be leaving her shift at the same time Sophia came in for her brother.

Then one day Sophia had left the gate they had separating the front and back yards of her house open and Liam had rushed out into the front yard, where he wasn't allowed without a leash. Sophia had gone to talk to her friends, not noticing Liam as he sniffed his way onto the blacktop.

He was hit by a truck, racing down their street.

Sophia had had to see it and stand in the road over his body while her brother called the vet's office as they were home alone. The vet hospital sent an ambulance and rushed Liam over, but the poor puppy had succumbed to his injuries and they weren't able to save him.

Sophia finished the story with difficulty, gasping out "It's all my fault!" Over and over. She continued to cry and Zelena folded the teen into her arms, rubbing the girl's back and reassuring her it wasn't her fault at all, but the fault of the driver who had been breaking the speed limit and not looking where he was going when he hit Liam.

Zelena gave Sophia as much time as she needed, letting the girl's tears soak into her shoulder. She was no psychologist, but she suspected Sophia hadn't been able to properly cry about the incident yet.

Sophia took several minutes get it all out. When she was done, she leaned back and her trembling hands came up to wipe her reddened eyes. She looked up at Zelena. "Thank you Ms. Mills," was all she said, and Zelena smiled gently, and it was enough.

The ride home was uneventful, but Zelena found that she had been so distracted by her own thoughts that she had forgotten to go shopping for dinner. And it was late and dark already.

She groaned and dropped her bag on the floor, not even bothering to remove her flats before making up a bowl of oatmeal and slumping on her couch to watch sad dog movies. She was crying barely minutes into the first one and an absolute mess after three.

A glance at the clock said it was eleven and she had work the next day. She spared a glance for the post-it note on her fridge that read "Monday would like you to leave it alone. It is not its fault that you are emotionally unprepared for your professional lives." She threw a piece of popcorn at it and missed.

Zelena slumped into the couch, feeling generally sad and discomfited. She would talk to Regina about her terrible day, but she was probably spending it with Robin, Henry, and Roland, Robin's son, and it was rude to interrupt their family time. This was the last day of the week Regina got to see her son Henry before he went back to Emma for another month. Her sister and her friend had an interesting history when it came to sharing their child.

Her coworkers were probably asleep along with the rest of her friends, who were probably with someone else or otherwise she didn't have their numbers. She frowned and sunk into the couch. Who else did she have to turn to for comfort?

She thought briefly of her mother but dismissed the idea quickly, not wanting to have the lecture to go along with the comfort. That left just one person, who was living in an area where it was currently eight at night.

She was loath to disturb her soulmate, but it was late on a Sunday night and she needed someone. Swallowing the guilt, she reached for a pen and drew little teardrops under her eyes, hoping that would get the message through.

Zelena lay around with nothing for about twenty minutes and was beginning to feel stupid when she felt a slight pressure under her eyes. She walked to the bathroom so she could actually see what was happening, and saw a little curve begin to appear, right near the bottom of the teardrops. The curvature matched that of the teardrop, then turned into a line that met the top of the teardrop. Her breath caught a little.

They were upside down, but now the teardrops had turned into little hearts, their soulmate symbol. The sign of silent support warmed her from the inside out and she was about to be content with the simple gesture when she felt the pressure again and watched raptly as the inside of the heart began to turn red, coloring over the line in the middle. Her soulmate colored in each one, until every heart was the proper color. Now she even looked happier than she had before.

Zelena felt a rush of gratitude towards her soulmate and with careful strokes traced an outline of a pair of lips on one of her cheeks, hoping they'd get it. Barely a minute later and several small diagonal lines drew themselves on her other cheek, the cartoon version of a blush.

She laughed out loud, thanking whatever unseen force had granted her someone so wonderful. She looked like a clown and surely they did too, but they had been willing to deal with that. For her.

She began to cry again and despite her best efforts to stop, a single tear trickled down her cheek, smudging one of the tear drop/hearts. The response was immediate, a thick swash of black ink that crossed the path of the tear. There was little elegance in the line, no purpose its appearance really served, as once again the sensation was more important; a thumb brushing the tear away.

Zelena wiped the tear away herself, but was so moved by the gesture she made sure to dot her pen on her forehead, nose, and both of her cheeks, hoping her soulmate could feel and interpret the tiny kisses.

She then stretched out her arm and drew a little nightcap above her wrist. Her soulmate responded by drawing another nightcap behind hers, just as floppy and looking as though the two were resting gently against each other.

Zelena let it all rest for a minute or two then washed her face completely, leaving the little nightcaps on her arm where they would disappear in twelve hours. She snuggled into her most comfortable pajamas, wrapped both arms around a giant stuffed monkey, and fell asleep, happy again.

/

Hades looked down at the little nightcaps on his arm and sighed in relief. It had really been quite the surprise when those little teardrops had begun to appear on his face. Thankfully he hadn't been near the main party when he felt the pressure of a pen on his face, but nonetheless it had been a little weird to rush to the bathroom in the middle of a conversation.

He saw the designs and immediately panicked as he had no writing utensil to respond to them with, to make his soulmate feel better. It was only after he texted Charon from the bathroom and together they concocted a plan that allowed Hades to go home without being seen, that he even realized how worried he was about his soulmate.

This level of concern for another person was unlike practically anything he had felt before, overcoming even the faintest of positive memories he had of his younger brothers. He rushed home, ignoring Charon's continued texts teasing him about how his reason for leaving had been a chivalrous, in Charon's eyes, "My soulmate needs me."

The minute he got in the house he rushed to the bathroom with a pen and fixed the problem as best he could, by turning the sadness of his soulmate into an expression of love.

His concern only developed further as he reflected on how long it took for him to get home, no matter how close to breaking the speed limit he had come so he rushed into his kitchen and pulled out a pack of children's markers his younger nieces and nephews had gifted him with one Christmas.

He pulled out the red one and began to fill in the hearts. When he was done he rested his elbows on the bathroom counter, catching his breath for the first time in a half hour.

This proved futile, as his breath whooshed away again with the outline of a pair of lips that appeared on his cheek. He ghosted his fingers over the outline, blushing. They hadn't filled in any detail, but already he wanted badly to meet them and feel their real lips, pressed against his cheek.

He responded the only way he could, with honesty. Hoping they would recognize the reference, he drew a blush mark on his other cheek. There wasn't a response for a minute then a smudge mark appeared on one of the teardrop/hearts. They were crying, for real.

Hades panicked totally for a millisecond but soon brought himself under control, feeling a fierce protectiveness for his soulmate well up inside him. Turning the black marker from the marker set on its side, he smudged it in a stripe across his face where he guessed the tear would have fallen.

He waited, unsmiling, then broke into a grin as he felt the little touches on his face, tiny kisses from his soulmate, saying they were alright.

With the addition of the two nightcaps they were done for the night and he could finally relax.

He scrolled through several of the texts from Charon, ignoring them all and just sending out a simple message, "My soulmate's ok. I think they're asleep now. Thanks for your help."

Charon's response was quick.

"No problem. Glad to hear it. Maybe you'll get to stay the whole party next week. :)"

Charon liked to use emojis. Hades laughed and sent his final text of the night, pleased with the implication that he'd be attending another party.

"Maybe I will."

Setting his phone to the side, Hades smiled at the ceiling, still feeling that fierce desire to defend his soulmate coursing through his body. The feeling was rather pleasant, a kind of hot solid-like mass that filled up his chest. Anger mixed with a sensation he was much too nervous to identify.

He decided to put a movie on, one of those soft romantic ones he liked to see when he was in a certain mood, and sure enough, he was asleep on the couch in a matter of minutes.

 **Author's note: Hello Zades Fandom! If you aren't already prepping to lynch me after the angst I dropped on you with Unfinished Business, I am here to assure you, I come in peace. And I bring the gift of a new chapter of fluff! Best enjoyed with a cup of lemonade and fuzzy socks. Please enjoy and R &R. **


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